RE: Any Nihilists here?
August 22, 2023 at 2:27 pm
(This post was last modified: August 22, 2023 at 2:27 pm by Angrboda.)
(August 22, 2023 at 1:36 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote:(August 22, 2023 at 12:17 pm)Angrboda Wrote: As long as there are statements about them which change whether it's good or bad, then it isn't objective. Who is it helping if it isn't helping them?
Any objective moral system has to respect change in factual details. Otherwise it wouldn't be objective. Subjective and non cognitivist moral systems are the ones that don't have to respect those changes - because those details aren't the basis of a subjectivist or noncognitivist assessment.
Not if those facts are subjective. That's what objective means.
(August 22, 2023 at 1:36 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote: Giving a person dying of thirst water is objectively helpful. It's why there's a duty to care even when prisoners go on hunger strikes. It's a good example of exclusively subotimal decision fields too, though, because in the process of saving their life we might override their own wishes and..arguably, reduce the effectiveness of their protest. So, in this situation, you're stuck with two bad options. In one of them you help and the guy might get angry with you, in the other you watch someone die when you could have helped. I'd say, at best, if you select the second option, you're both morally and practically apathetic. At worst, you might be personally culpable for their death.
You're trying to demonstrate that at least one thing is objectively good / bad. You can't do that by assuming that some other thing that you haven't shown to be objectively morally good which implies the other thing is itself morally good. That's just begging the question. You haven't answered the objection, all you've done is kick the can down the road.